Cuba, OSPAAAL (Organization of Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa, and Latin America), 1971 and 1972

Extensive and Culturally Significant Archive of Approximately 500 Political Posters. An important, unique, and carefully curated collection of political posters, dated from approximately the 1960s to the 2000s, from a wide variety of leftist and militant groups in Europe, the Middle East, Asia, and Latin America, related to a broad range of domestic and international movements and issues, providing an essential overview of the global political climate at the time with regards to radicalism, solidarity, and liberation. Some with scattered soiling, marginal tears, tack holes, and other minor losses, overall excellent condition. Various sizes. Various cities, 1960s-2000s.

France, MRI (Mouvement Revolutionaire Internationaliste), 1980s

This collection documents a vital period in the history of both Western Europe and Third World countries in the second half of the 20th century, a time of political upheaval, domestic terrorism, radical left-wing groups, and liberation movements. The posters that make up this collection can be roughly divided into three categories. First, a large number of the posters document the struggle of the militant left at home within Europe, with movements from Germany, Belgium, France, the Netherlands, Spain, Italy, and Ireland covered including Antifaschistische Aktion, RAF (Red Army Faction), RZ (Revolutionäre Zellen), Secours Rouge, CCC (Cellules Communistes Combattantes), CPN (Communist Party of the Netherlands), Kraakbeweging, RVF (Rood Verzetsfront), AFAPP (Asociación de Familiares y Amigos de Presos Politicos), Moviment de Defensa de la Terra, FRAP (Frente Revolucionario Antifascista y Patriota), Circolo Lenin Catania, Sinn Féin, and the Irish Republican Army. These posters cover a range of issues, including the treatment of political prisoners, hunger strikes, anti-capitalism, anti-imperialism, anti-NATO, urban development, housing shortages, squatters, election reform, the women’s movement, and the labor movement.

Lastly, the third group of posters represents the political climate within the Third World countries themselves, including organizations such as the Cuban group OSPAAAL (Organization of Solidarity with the People of Asia, Africa, and Latin America), FMLN from El Salvador (Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front), Partido Comunista del Peru, ASALA (Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia), FATAH (Palestinian National Liberation Movement), PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization), PFLP (People’s Liberation Front of Palestine), GUPW (General Union of Palestinian Women), PKK (Kurdistan Worker’s Party), YJWK (Patriotic Women’s Union of Kurdistan), ERNK (National Liberation Front of Kurdistan), and YAJK (Free Women’s Army of Kurdistan).

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